at a glance...

Hometown: St. Louis, MO
First Recordings: 1945

Personnel:
Miles Davis -trumpet
Wayne Shorter -tenor saxophone
Ron Carter -bass
Herbie Hancock -piano
Tony Williams -drums

Related Artists:
Weather Report, Ron Carter, Chick Corea, Herbie Hancock

Notes:
From his first recordings with Charlie Parker until his death in 1991, Miles Davis was a hugely influential and often controversial figure in jazz. He was present at the birth of bebop, cool, modal, and fusion jazz, and with the latter three he was also one of the parents.

E.S.P. was Miles Davis's first record of all-new compositions since 1959's Kind Of Blue, and like that record it defined the trumpeter's musical concerns of the moment. Kind Of Blue abandoned bebop's chordal density in favor of simplified structures and muted lyricism; on E.S.P, which was the studio debut of Davis's classic mid 60s quintet, he tried to move his music ahead without giving in to what he deemed the ugliness of free jazz.

The band's seven originals showcased a streamlined abstraction. On uptempo tunes like the title track and "Agitation" Davis and Shorter fairly flew over the steaming rhythm section, but drummer Tony Williams's explosive accents disrupted the music's apparent linear quality. At the other end of the dynamic spectrum, Shorter's oblique counterpoint to the leader's muted solo on the album closing ballad "Mood" seemed to fold in upon itself as the horns floated dream-like over open spaces. Even the hard-swinging blues "Eighty-One" jumped from one groove to another; an apparent toe-tapper was a study in hazardous rhythmic instability.

This rare blend of conceptual sophistication and accessibility was Davis's last stop on the jazz train; in his next phase he embraced rock textures and soul rhythms and came up with Bitches Brew.